Nuclear Power: Is it Necessary?
In its attempts to harness the power of the atom, mankind has itself in the possession of weapons with unbelievable, destructive power. Nations now have the ability to destroy entire cities from hundreds of miles away, in only minutes. These weapons are nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons cost the citizens of the United States billions of dollars in taxes each year, the testing and maintenance of these weapons pose serious health risks, and the actual need for these weapons is not and has not been around for years. For the above reasons, the United States should reduce its nuclear arsenal.
Nuclear weapons derive their power from the energy released when a heavy nucleus is divided, called fission or when light nuclei are forced together, called fusion. In fission, a nucleus from a heavy element is bombarded with neutrons. The nucleus breaks into two pieces, releasing energy and two or more neutrons. Each of these neutrons has enough energy to split another heavy nucleus, allowing the process to repeat itself. This is the chain reaction that makes nuclear weapons possible. In a fusion nuclear device such as a hydrogen bomb, lightweight nuclei are forced to fuse at very high temperatures into heavier nuclei, releasing energy and a neutron. In order to squeeze the two nuclei together, an atomic fission bomb is usually used. A fusion reaction releases about four times more energy per unit mass than a fission reaction. The United States supervised the development of the atomic bomb under the code name Manhattan Project, during World War II. The first nuclear chain reaction occurred in December 1942, at the University of Chicago. Soon after the first bomb test, atomic bombs were dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The first hydrogen bomb was developed by a team of United States scientists and was first tested on November 1, 1952. After World War II, a new age of military strategy occurred. The United States built up massive nuclear weapons arsenals and developed highly sophisticated systems of delivery and defense. Today's intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) carry one or more multiple, independently targeted reentry vehicles (MIBVs), each with its own nuclear war head.
Billions of dollars are wasted in taxes, each year, to pay for nuclear weapons (Rosenberg 1). The United States has spent about...
... middle of paper ...
...tructive. Anyone with the experiences of World War II behind them would not want to repeat the horror of that. Even before the nuclear bomb had been perfected, world war had become spectacularly costly and destructive, killing over fifty million people world wide (Cameron 66).
Nuclear weapons are weapons of great destruction. Our government wastes over thirty-three billion dollars a year of our tax money. Also, nuclear weapons pose serious health risks to those around them, including the citizens of the United States. There has not been a significant impact on world affairs by nuclear weapons since World War II. For these reasons, the United States should reduce its nuclear arsenal.
WORKS CITED
Cameron, Kevin. "Taking Apart the Bomb." Popular Science. April 1993:
64- 70.
Project Director. "The U.S. Nuclear Cost Study Project." Prodigy Web
Browser. 1994.
Schwartz, Stephen. "Nuclear Weapons." Compton's Interactive
Encyclopedia. CD-ROM. 1995 ed.
Rosenberg, David Alan. “A Historian’s Assessment of Atomic Audit.” The
Hidden Costs of Our Nuclear Arsenal. 30 June. 1998
<http://www.brook.edu/dybdocroot/fp/projects/nucwcost/rosenberg.htm>
In today’s society many countries and even citizens of the United States question the U.S. government’s decision to get in involved in nuclear warfare. These people deemed it unnecessary and state that the U.S. is a hypocrite that preaches peace, but causes destruction and death. Before and during World War II the U.S. was presented with a difficult decision on whether or not to develop and use the atomic bomb.
The United States is currently spending $35 Billion a year; which is 14% of the defense budget, or it is $96 million a day, because of the nuclear efforts of which about $25 million goes for operation and maintenance for the nuclear arsenal. The rest of the money is spent on cleanup, arms control verification, and ballistic missile research, which all of that, just adds to the cost greatly. President Obama revealed a budget that includes more than $220 million in cuts for nuclear security programs in the next fiscal year. One of the largest reductions is going to come to the International Material Protection and Cooperation program, and which it works to secure and eliminate the vulnerable nuclear weapons and materials. President Obama asked for $ 3.5 million or $114 million less than was appropriated in the 2014 budget. President Obama has also requested $108 million less than was appropriated last year for the Global Threat Reduction Initiative; this is a program that actually plays a key part in the “Energy Department’s effort at preventing terrorist from obtaining nuclear and radiological materials that could be used in weapons of mass destruction” (Silverberg). Should the U.S. Congress amend the D.O.D. Appropriations Act of 2015 to eliminate funding for nuclear weapons production?
Together with the Soviet Union we have made the crucial breakthroughs that have begun the process of limiting nuclear arms. But we must set as our goal not just limiting but reducing and finally destroying these terrible weapons so that they cannot destroy civilization and so that the threat of nuclear war will no longer hang over the world and the people.
While most people are scared of the devastation caused by nuclear weapons, they do keep the world safe. The fear caused by such weapons actually keeps countries closer to peace. When nations come into conflict they keep it minimal as they are scared to cross boundaries and have a nuclear strike. Countries out there are always going to have nuclear weapons, so the United States must keep them so others are to scared to have us retaliate. Some scientist believes that we might need them other than war, such as to stop a meteor from hitting the earth. Accuracy has been revolutionized to keep a small nuclear strike as small as possible without the high number of casualties.
agree with them on, it is this. The construction of nuclear weapons is expensive and since
Eric Schollser argues in his paper “Today’s Nuclear Dilemma,” that the nuclear weapons in the world, and the issues that they are associated with, should be of major concern to today’s society. Nuclear Weapons were of world wide concern during the time of the Cold War. These weapons, and their ability to cause colossal devastation, brought nightmares into reality as the threat of nuclear war was a serious and imminent issue. The US and Russia both built up their inventories of these pieces of artillery, along with the rest of their arsenals, in an attempt to overpower the other. This past terror has become a renewed concern because many of the countries with these nuclear weapons in their control have started to update their collections. One
August 5, 1945. A day that the entire world will remember, as it was the day that the first of two nuclear strikes against Japan ended World War Two. Although at the time “Fat Man” and “Little Boy” were the lesser of two evils, they started an arms race like the world has never seen. The Soviet Union, America, Great Britain, France, and later China, all started to produce nuclear weapons. The arsenals of these countries would soon number in the tens of thousands. Recently there have been pushes to rid the world of these weapons that can kill an entire city with a single push of a button. Although these weapons are in the eyes of several governments a necessary tool to have, the public, however, disagrees. The Americans in particular have been debating the issue for several years. But for America to still pose a threat to other countries, the nuclear arsenal of the United States of America should not be completely depleted but upgraded and decreased to where our enemies still fear us. But we have to make sure that we do not break the bank in the process.
Nuclear Arms, as opposed to conventional arms, generate their destructive force from nuclear reactions. The issues that are related to the use of nuclear weapons is also far different than the issues generated by conventional bombs. The long term
As the cold war had brought upon a lot of conflict, it had also had the struggle of the economy from the remnants of the Second World War and the 70’s that had really brought the entire situation down. In the beginning of the nuclear arms race, it was commonly believed that nuclear weapons provided more benefits than the cost was so they justified their somewhat frivolous spending. While the greater explosive power of nuclear weapons may cause them to be cheaper per kiloton, as wholesale of a particular item does in today’s world, this statement proves to be untrue for the arms race and it even hides the actual economic costs of the nuclear weapons. Economic pressure had already been with the United States from the previous years that had left a negative impact before the beginning of the nuclear arms race, and all the millions, billions, and even trillions spent on acc...
Nuclear power was always thought to be far too great to ever be used for harm. Many United States officials came to this belief as well, but only once it was too late. At the end of World War II, it was known that Japan was looking for the easiest way to surrender with the least possible consequences toward. It was known that the dropping of the atomic bomb would kill and injure thousands of innocent lives, and destroy everything in its path. Lastly, it was known that the dropping of the atomic bomb would forever change weaponry because a new type of weapon was born. The United States was not justified in dropping the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki because Japan was on the verge of surrender; it caused harm to thousands of innocent lives, and changed weaponry forever.
Currently, the figures are a bit more gentle on the United States’ annual budget but still astronomical in its own right. Annually, the United States spends at least $33 billion on nuclear weapons and weapon-related activities, which is equivalent to about 13 percent of all military spending. Of this $33 billion, $8 billion is spent annually on nuclear waste management, environmental remediation, weapons dismantling, and disposition activities. The majo...
It’s obvious that we can’t take care of 4,800 nuclear warheads, so why not reduce them. According to the Federation of American Scientists since Obama became president only 309 have been dismantled. According to the Congressional Budget Office we are spending $355 billion dollars to stock something we don’t really need. If America was a T-rex, the nuclear weapons would be its arms. Completely useless and the t-rex is plenty scary without them.
The cold war, an issue of global importance in 1947-1991 that prompted the creation of the H-bomb in 1949 when the Soviets had successfully detonated an atomic bomb (The First hydrogen bomb test, 2011). By using the previously developed formulas and techniques that made the atomic bomb, the combination of nuclear fission and fusion created the H-bomb, a weapon of significantly higher destructive power than the nuclear bomb during this time (The Development and Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, n.d.). While the atomic bomb used fission to get its destructive power the thermonuclear bomb used a combination of both. Fission would work as a trigger to the fusion. For the process that the H-bomb goes through it is necessary to have fission happen
In 1945, when the Americans bombed Hiroshima, Japan, approximately 140,000 men and women were instantly killed by the effects of American nuclear defense. With such extreme brutality and force how many people must die for one to finally realize the strengths of nuclear bombs and what damage they can cause. Nuclear weapons should be outlawed because they kill thousands of innocent humans at a time, destroy the environment, and inviolate human’s right to moral and personal freedoms.
The society may devote less to produce nuclear weapons because the majority expect a peaceful world without wars. However, that does not mean the society should totally stop making those; it just means that society should spend less effort. In the long term, all countries still need them as a “security blank” in case of any future problems (Nautilus Institute 2013). It is also possible for the global society to devote less on education and poverty. These are two tough issues in current world. It takes a long time to improve these, but they still need to be solved. Nevertheless, preventing the environment from any future destroy seems to be more urgent.